2004 CAJA MADRID FESTIVAL
Fernando Terremoto. Miguel Poveda. Gabriel Moreno

Today's young blood and yesterday's maestros

Candela Olivo. Madrid, February 19th, 2004
Photos: Daniel Muñoz

Artist credits. Fernando Terremoto, cante and Antonio Higuero, guitar. Miguel Poveda, cante and Chicuelo, guitar. Gabriel Moreno, cante and José María Molero, guitar. Albéniz Theater. Madrid, February 19th, 2004. 9 p.m.

Cante showed some other of its many faces. The third day of the Madrilenian festival, which ended up being named 'The Magic of Flamenco Music' - as it could have been called anything else -, traced a triangle of distant vertices: Jerez, Barcelona and Jaén. Fernando Terremoto made a show of vocal power, of rhythm. Miguel Poveda bet on preciosity, on rest. Gabriel Moreno reunited with his fans seeking to exude drops of his mastery in the past.

Jerez. Although, as he demonstrated a bit later, the son of Terremoto de Jerez does not need technology to amplify his tremendous voice, he started off seated before the microphone with a soleá through bulerías. Even the first quejío was answered with an olé. The crowd had been won over beforehand. True to his usual repertoire, he continued through malagueñas. He did so smoothly, without shrillness; in him, restraint is a real virtue. The guitar... reliable, right, unannoying. He also presented the seguiriyas with a fine thread of a voice, withdrawn, deep, from the cave. And he released all the emotionality contained in this style which is fail-safe in the bulería for someone from Jerez. Before loosening up to the beat of his native region, he flooded the theater with his seismic voice through fandangos. The audience trembles. And he makes it come out of its trance to the rhythm of the Santiago neighborhood, with and without a microphone, with and without dancing about.

Miguel Poveda and Chicuelo

Barcelona. He sings with sense and sensibility. Miguel Poveda is maturing on stage, performance by performance. Every time there is an opportunity to hear him live, he goes up a point, up a degree. He warmed up with those aires levantinos he wears so well, seconded by a guitar with importance and understanding, that of his inseparable Chicuelo. From the most subtle to the most obvious. From down to up. And the crowd loves it. A baroque "ay" of lace guides him towards fandango territory. "Not even anyone who remembers me, I have nobody who loves me... ". And from the east to the Andalusian west. The cantaor stops in Cádiz, with 'tirititrán', with flavor, with rhythmic tapping. The popular, to Camarón, through Alberti... a pinch of everything goes into these savory cantiñas. Heads... and now tails. The guitar goes silent and, 'tran tran', the cantaor rips loose in an extensive batch of tonás which, as a detail, includes 'Canto de la resignación' by Carmen Linares. And he is as pleasant keeping alive the popular legacy as he is turning to the contemporary. The guitar picks him up through seguiriyas, whose end he bids farewell to with tientos tangos that stop time, filled with vocal details.

Jaén. Following the break, it was veteran Gabriel Moreno's turn. As he himself said, "I haven't sung for some time now". And that being out of shape tarnished a recital awaited by those who consider the Linares-born cantaor to be a real maestro. To begin with, in view of the fresh colleagues who preceded him, it did not work to his advantage. Proving right those who consider him as an encyclopedic artist, he performed - accompanied by Jerez-born guitarist José María Molero, a usual of the Sorderas - malagueñas, seguiriyas, the tangos 'Las tejas de tu tejao', soleá, tarantas and levanticas "that I do my way" and finally, bulerías. Without skimping on appreciation to the crowd that did not abandon him, he defended this repertoire with delicacy and it could be said with sincerity, although last night's faculties were not the ones that made him shine in the past.

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